Time & Space
by arianna99
Summary: AU. What if, after Sam left John behind, Dean decides to do the same? Smart!Dean. Gen. Rated for swearing.


**Title: **Time & Space  
**Fandom: **SPN  
**Pairing: **None. Gen. I wrote gen!fic. Oh, my god.  
**Rating: **PG-13, for minor swearing.  
**Disclaimer: **Not mine  
**Summary: **AU. What if, after Sam left, Dean decides to do the same? Smart!Dean.

**Five Years Ago**

Sam's gone. John gave him the choice, a life or his family, and he chose to go have a life.

Who can blame him?

John. That's who.

Dean, as well, but Dean doesn't. Dean wouldn't.

"I'm sleeping in the car tonight," Dean says when they reach the motel, not even bothering to look John in the eye.

"Dean," John starts to say.

"No," Dean says.

It's not a word John hears from Dean very often.

"I don't wanna hear it, dad," Dean says, quieter. "I get it. I just don't wanna hear it. And I don't wanna see you now."

"Okay," John says. He's never really understood how Dean ticks, because they're fundamentally dissimilar in ways even shared guns and music won't help. But he can give Dean what he needs if Dean asks for it.

The problem is that Dean never does.

-

**Present Day**

Dad comes as soon as he hears. It's just a day after the fact when the rumble of his truck alerts Sam to his presence. Sam is sitting on the curb outside what used to be his and Jessica's apartment, staring at the charred remnants of his normal life.

Whenever Sam imagined seeing his dad again, it wasn't like this.

It was a dream vision, with Jessica in a white dress and Dean in a suit, grinning at him and wishing him all the best.

"Dad," he says, and he's a bit choked and a bit broken.

"Hey, Sammy," Dad says. "I'm so sorry."

They haven't spoken in five years, and they haven't hugged in about ten. Doesn't matter, though, they're hugging now.

"I wanna come home," Sam says. "If you'll let me."

Home is Jess, home is their bed and Stanford and someday, a house with a white picket fence. But that's the home Sam wants. The home Sam has, the home Sam has always had, is a crappy motel room and the backseat of the Impala.

"Sure thing," Dad says.

"Where's Dean?" Sam asks.

Dad lets out a shaky laugh. "I have no idea. I haven't seen him in five years."

-

**Five Years Ago**

When John wakes up, the Impala is gone. Pulled out of the parking lot and just plain old gone. With it Dean and every damn gun in the trunk.

John doesn't know what to do. They're not hunting anything, and there's not a single sign of anything supernatural in the area.

Only when John's scoured the town twice over for his son does he finally open up his cell phone and listen to his voicemail.

"Hey dad," Dean says, the rush of freeway around his voice indicating that he's probably far away now. "Sorry I didn't say goodbye, but it's not like you'd have wanted me to go. I just need some time alone, okay? I'll let you know when I've got a hunt."

-

**Present Day**

"No," Sam says. "No, that's not possible."

"I think I'd know when I last saw your brother, Sam," Dad says, in his warning tone.

"But he called me two weeks ago," Sam says. "He called and said you'd just ganked a spirit together."

Dad curses, rifles through the glove compartment and pulls out a folded over piece of notebook paper. In Dean's handwriting, it says, _Hey, Dad, ganked a spirit the other day. Did you know you can get them to move on without salt & burn? –Dean._

Dad draws out a small wooden box filled to the brim with notes like that, written on the backs of receipts and shopping lists in Dean's unruly scrawl.

"He sends 'em to this post box I got in Philly," John says. "I stop by there as often as I can, and there's almost always a new one. Never been able to find him."

"Why?" Sam asks.

"Because he's good."

"No, I mean, why'd he leave?"

"He never said," Dad says. "Just left the day after you did."

Sam's not sure if he's afraid or hopeful that it was because of him.

-

**Five Years Ago**

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Dean? Dean, where the hell are you?"

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Look, Dean, I'm sorry about what I said to Sam, but you know what we get like."

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Dean, are you gonna come back?"

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Look, Dean, it's been a week. I'm worried about you, okay? Give me a call. I swear I won't yell."

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Just give me some sign you're okay, buddy. I've got a post box in Philadelphia. You've got the address. If you don't wanna talk, write."

*beep* Hey, this is Dean. I'm not around right now, so just leave a message and I'll call you back. If it's urgent, call Bobby Singer.

"Got your note. Thanks. You know how to find me if you want to."

-

**Present Day**

It's a long drive if you don't know where you're going and you haven't talked in five years.

"I've been getting closer to the demon that killed your mom," Dad says eventually.

"And Jess," Sam says, staring pointedly out the window.

"And Jess," Dad agrees. "I guess…I dunno. We could go after it."

"The two of us?" Sam asks.

For possibly the first time since they met up again, Sam meets Dad's eyes.

They both snort.

"Fat chance," Dad says.

"We'd kill each other in a week," Sam says.

"Less," Dad agrees.

"We've gotta find Dean."

"Yeah," Sam says.

"Doesn't feel right, going after it without him."

-

**Five Years Ago**

"And I'm telling you, John, if the boy doesn't want to be found, you're not gonna find him."

John sighs, aggravated. "You must know where he is."

"I've got suspicions," Bobby says. "But I sure as hell ain't sharing them with you."

-

**Present Day**

"So you two finally made up?" Bobby asks, but keeps right on talking. That's okay, Sam's not going to answer, and he doubts Dad is. "Bout time, too. What's it been, five years?"

"Yeah," Dad says.

"Cut to the chase, John. What do you want?"

"Dean."

Bobby's expression darkens. He always liked Dean best of the three Winchester men. "I promised him a long time ago I wouldn't be ratting out his secrets to anyone, least of all you two morons."

"I can find it now, Bobby," Dad says. "I can find the damn thing and put an end to it."

"Open your eyes," Bobby says, "It's been over for years, for everyone but you."

"No it's not," Sam says, and Bobby looks at him, surprised. It's probably the first time he's agreed with Dad since he was about eight. "It killed my girlfriend, Bobby, and I think it did something to me. I've been having…visions. Nightmares."

"Huh," Bobby says, after a while. "That changes things. Lemme show you something."

-

**Five Years Ago**

For a while, John looks up the hunts Dean writes he's been on. There's a lot of hunters, though, and a lot of spirits, and it's pretty damn hard to find evidence for a hunt that's over. He finds one in upstate New York, a haunted portrait that Dean says he took care of, a nice lady who's willing to tell him all about the handsome young man who dealt with it.

When John asks where he is, she smiles.

"Oh, now," she says, "he told me you'd come looking for him. I promised I wouldn't tell."

-

**Present Day**

"See, the reason you never found Dean," Bobby says, "is that you didn't know where to look." He dumps a binder in front of them and opens it to the first page. It's Dean's school transcripts. All of them. Copies of report cards and complaints about bad behavior, all the stuff Sam's seen before.

Except that in the shoebox Dad keeps well-hidden in the back of the truck, the report cards get worse and worse as Dean gets older.

These don't. In fact, they level at straight As around grade five and never change. The complaints about roughhousing and disrespect continue, but they're joined by letters from teachers about how talented Dean is and how willing to learn, and in some cases, how the bad behavior is not his fault but is almost always provoked and in defense of someone else.

Sam doesn't know what to say. He always thought he was the smart one.

"Why did he…what?" Dad asks, completely confused for the first time in Sam's memory.

"He didn't want you seeing all this," Bobby says. "I handled his transcripts for him, made some forgeries for you. He was the one who sent all the documents to schools, remember?"

Sam does. "Why didn't he want us seeing?"

"Thought your Dad wouldn't approve. Drawing attention to himself. Thought you'd be upset you weren't the only smart Winchester after all." Bobby shrugs. "I think he liked having something just for himself, too."

"Bobby," Dad asks, voice low and dangerous. "What the fuck is this?"

"That's a copy of his bachelor's degree." Bobby says flatly. "You can take courses online now. He did, told them he had a family member with a severe disability he had to take care of. Graduated college the year you left, Sam."

"These are…really good scores," Sam says.

"He's a smart kid," Bobby says. "Go on."

The last page in the binder is a letter of admission. To grad school. At MIT.

"He wasn't gonna go," Bobby says. "He said he didn't want to leave you. He knew Sam was going and he didn't want you to be alone, but then something changed. Just upped and left. Good, solid decision if you ask me." He glares at the two Winchester men on his couch. "He defended his dissertation just last week. You had better not screw this up for him."

-

**Five Years Ago**

John never really stops looking for Dean. He looks in smoky bars and flaky motels, he looks in pool halls and strip joints. He looks in greasy diners and at every damn haunting, killing and maiming he sees.

He looks whenever there's a John Doe in any morgue that matches Dean's description.

He scours the Stanford area for a shadow of his son, watching over his little brother like he always has.

The only place he never looks for Dean is in a lab in a university, writing his dissertation.

-

**Present Day**

They don't talk much on the drive up to Boston. There's not much to say. Most of it should be said to Dean, anyway.

Dean Smith, by all accounts, is a stand-up citizen, a good drinking buddy, the smartest kid to ever get a doctorate in engineering, a crazy goofball who likes to blow things up, a Casanova, the guy you want on your side in a fight, and the most mysterious son of a bitch anyone's ever met.

They find him in a café, drinking coffee with a woman in her mid-forties. "I know you don't like talking about the future, Dean," she's saying in fond exasperation, "but the places you could go…CERN wants to meet you, you could go into teaching, you could…"

"Laura, please stop," Dean says, sounding amused. "Maybe later. I can't leave the states, I've got family here."

"Right," she says, slowly. "Whom you never go visit. And who never comes here."

"They're here right now," Dean says easily. "Hi, dad. Sammy."

"Knew I couldn't pull one over you," Dad says, standing up from the table they've been subtly eavesdropping from. "Good to see you, son."

They hug, with big manly slapping noises to disguise all tenderness.

"Hey, Dean," Sam says, quieter.

"Hey," Dean says. "I'm so sorry about your girlfriend. If I had known-"

"It's okay," Sam says. "You didn't." And they hug, too, less bravado and more emotion.

"Are you going to introduce me?" The woman at the table asks.

"Sure thing," Dean says. "Laura, this is my dad John and my brother Sam. Dad, Sam, this is my professor, Laura Fisher."

"Pleased to meet you," she says. "I really have to go now, but Dean, I expect a phone call as soon as you accept a job offer."

"Sure thing," Dean says with a sleazy smile. She rolls her eyes at him and leaves.

"Professor?" John asks. "Little friendly for a teacher."

"It's different when you're doing a doctorate," Dean says. "More like colleagues, with mentoring."

"Huh," John says.

Dean takes them back to his apartment. It's not exactly huge, and the kitchen table is littered with schematics and gizmos that light up and beep when you touch them.

"I like making things from scratch," is all Dean says to that. "Um, if you want, Dad can take the couch and Sammy can share my bed, like we used to."

"Sounds good," John says. "Where'd you get the money?"

"University gives you money for grad school," Dean says, "and I've got some stuff saved."

"Since when?" Sam asks.

"Since I figured out how to work a bank account and I got my first job," Dean says. He'd been fourteen at the time, working at a supermarket.

"And when were you planning on telling us all this?"

"Never," Dean says blankly. "My grades were nobody's business and I never actually planned on leaving."

Sam opens his mouth to ask why he did, then, but Dean stops him.

"Look, I got some stuff that may come in handy," Dean says. He opens a door in the hall, next to a bookshelf full of books that Sam's either read himself as part of his own education or doesn't even understand the titles of.

The room is dark, but clean, with a bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling. The walls are covered in tacked-up news articles, print-outs and pictures.

"Demon's called Azazel," Dean says. "He got a bunch of other people the way he got mom, and I think Sam-"

"Visions," Sam says, reading through one of the articles. "I have visions. This guy has telekinesis."

"Had," Dean says. "He blew his brains out after killing his whole family."

"Jesus Christ," Sam says.

"They were abusive motherfuckers," Dean says, as if that justifies it.

Then again, Dean's always been a math person. Maybe simple logic justifies more things to him than it does to Sam.

"I can tell you where the next attack's going to be," Dean says. "There are signs. I wish I could have warned you, Sam, but…well, you just had to go live in Stanford. There's not many cattle to kill, and weird weather isn't weird in California."

Sam chokes on a laugh.

"So are we gonna do this?" Dad asks.

"Yeah," Dean says. "We are. Under one condition."

"What's that?"

"When it's over, we compromise. We can hunt and be normal, y'know. I've been doing it for five years."

"Dean?"

"Yeah?"

Sam gives him a calculating look. "You never wanted that before. Why now?"

Dean smiles. "I always wanted that. Used to think it was stupid."

"What changed your mind?"

Dean claps Dad on the shoulder. "I figured out what mom would've wanted."

-

**Five Years Ago**

In the back of the car, Dean sleeps, cold and miserable though he is.

"Dean," She says. "Dean."

Her hair is slightly curled, and her white nightgown is blowing in the wind.

Dean gets out of the car. He can tell he's dreaming, but he doesn't really care.

"Mom?"

"Dean, sweetie," She says, "I never wanted this for you."

Dean smiles. "Don't think anyone did. You real?"

"No. I'm dead, hon. I'm just about as real as those spirits you kill."

"Oh."

"Dean." She puts a cold, small hand on his cheek. "My strong boy. You know, you've been doing so much for them, for so long."

"I don't mind," Dean says.

"I know you don't," she says. "But right now, the best thing you can do for them is to not to anything."

"Why?"

"Because they need to grow up," she says, "and we can't always be holding them back."

A tear slips out of Dean's eye.

"I'm sorry, baby, but you know it's time to go. John's going to have to learn that not everything is about revenge, and Sammy's going to have to learn to take care of himself. And so are you."

"I can take care of myself," Dean says, affronted.

"I know you can," she says, "but you don't know how to make yourself happy. Try."

Dean wakes up. The world is a bit colder and a bit greyer.

"You know what, mom?" he says to the night. "You're right. Maybe it will be better this way."

As he drives out of the motel parking lot and towards Boston, he could swear he feels her press a kiss to his cheek.


End file.
